1) My Memaw- last Saturday, we went to the ER with her for hip/leg pain. She has had like 4 hip replacements so this is kind of a big deal. With my Papa not being here anymore, we all have to step up as a family and help her out in any way we can. She has been in constant pain but the doctors have said that nothing is broken and that they can't really find anything wrong yet. We are each spending the night with her on different nights because she can't even get out of her chair on her own. Please just pray for patience for the family as she is bipolar and can get a little edgy with everyone sometimes.
2) Nathan's cousin Gabby and his Aunt Teresa were in a pretty bad accident last week. Aunt Teresa walked away with a few cuts and bruises but Gabby has 2 broken humorus (upper arms) and a broken femur (upper leg). Please just pray for safe healing for her. Shes 12 years old so its going to take some adjusting to not being able to do anything for herself.
3) My cousin Amanda (shes my fav :) has a sickness called Pancreatitis. She is at Mayo Clinic in Minnesota right now trying to learn ways to deal with the pain and hopefully they can help to maybe someday fix it. You can read a little more about what it is below....
“Where to begin with this horrible illness? Pancreatitis is disease that causes extreme pain, pain that docs say is worse than childbirth. The pancreas is a very little spongy organ at the top of your stomach that is responsible for producing insulin and for producing the enzymes that digest the food you eat. Pancreatitis the pancreas becomes inflamed and the enzymes become active inside the pancreas and it basically tries to digest itself. To get thru an attack, you give your stomach complete rest (that means no food or drink) and just wait it out. I've added a link below to Mayo website that describes the disease in detail.
Amanda is my first born, born in August 1992, which arrived 6 weeks premature. I've often wondered if being a preemie has anything to do with this. Who knows? It was in August of 1998 that she was first diagnosed with pancreatitis. She had been vomiting all day and was in so much pain, she would just cry out. She was only 6 and her cries were heartbreaking. After a very long night in the ER, we were finally given a diagnosis of pancreatitis. The started IV's and put a NG tube in her nose to keep her stomach pumped. I remember in the beginning the doctors telling us that Pancreatitis in children is rare. Kids never get this disease and she'll probably never get it again. Each time it happened again, the doctors were unsure why this kept happening.
The night before Amanda started 6th grade, she had a really bad pancreatitis attack. (Yes, we have found that stress and lack of sleep are triggers). After a week at a Tulsa hospital, things were not getting better and she started have other issues. We had been seeing a Pediatric GI specialist in St Louis, and he recommended that we transfer Amanda to St Louis Children's Hospital. We spent the next 4 1/2 weeks in St Louis have many many many tests done. We discovered that Amanda had some "small" ducts in her pancreas and she had scar tissue on her pancreas from previous attacks. We were finally able to come home on Jeff's birthday, Oct 3, but Amanda was still not eating and she had retained an IV at home for the next 2 weeks. She was finally able to get back to school after fall break. She has always had the ability to bounce back and has such a wonderful attitude about all of this.
Here we are, 12 years later, too many hospitalizations to count, many many tests, procedures, and specialists, only to not have any better answers than when we started.
In the last 2 years, the illness has taken on a more chronic nature. In the beginning, she would get sick once or twice a year, and in between, she would be perfectly healthy child. Now she deals with pain almost daily and 1 or 2 times a month, has pain that keeps her home from school. This has been a very a challenging time as it affects the entire family. Jeff and I have to become nurse and monitor pain medication at home which puts us in difficult positions at times.
Amanda is headed to Mayo Clinic in March to attend a Pain Management Program. It is a 3 week out patient program geared to adolescents that deal with chronic pain illnesses. The program is designed to help educate you about alternative ways to cope with pain. We are all praying that this program will bring Amanda some confidence about dealing with this disease on her own, as well as teach the entire family about dealing with pain management. I would ask for your prayers for Amanda and our family as we begin this journey.”
Amanda is my first born, born in August 1992, which arrived 6 weeks premature. I've often wondered if being a preemie has anything to do with this. Who knows? It was in August of 1998 that she was first diagnosed with pancreatitis. She had been vomiting all day and was in so much pain, she would just cry out. She was only 6 and her cries were heartbreaking. After a very long night in the ER, we were finally given a diagnosis of pancreatitis. The started IV's and put a NG tube in her nose to keep her stomach pumped. I remember in the beginning the doctors telling us that Pancreatitis in children is rare. Kids never get this disease and she'll probably never get it again. Each time it happened again, the doctors were unsure why this kept happening.
The night before Amanda started 6th grade, she had a really bad pancreatitis attack. (Yes, we have found that stress and lack of sleep are triggers). After a week at a Tulsa hospital, things were not getting better and she started have other issues. We had been seeing a Pediatric GI specialist in St Louis, and he recommended that we transfer Amanda to St Louis Children's Hospital. We spent the next 4 1/2 weeks in St Louis have many many many tests done. We discovered that Amanda had some "small" ducts in her pancreas and she had scar tissue on her pancreas from previous attacks. We were finally able to come home on Jeff's birthday, Oct 3, but Amanda was still not eating and she had retained an IV at home for the next 2 weeks. She was finally able to get back to school after fall break. She has always had the ability to bounce back and has such a wonderful attitude about all of this.
Here we are, 12 years later, too many hospitalizations to count, many many tests, procedures, and specialists, only to not have any better answers than when we started.
In the last 2 years, the illness has taken on a more chronic nature. In the beginning, she would get sick once or twice a year, and in between, she would be perfectly healthy child. Now she deals with pain almost daily and 1 or 2 times a month, has pain that keeps her home from school. This has been a very a challenging time as it affects the entire family. Jeff and I have to become nurse and monitor pain medication at home which puts us in difficult positions at times.
Amanda is headed to Mayo Clinic in March to attend a Pain Management Program. It is a 3 week out patient program geared to adolescents that deal with chronic pain illnesses. The program is designed to help educate you about alternative ways to cope with pain. We are all praying that this program will bring Amanda some confidence about dealing with this disease on her own, as well as teach the entire family about dealing with pain management. I would ask for your prayers for Amanda and our family as we begin this journey.”
Amanda and I are SUPER close...shes one of my best friends so if you could just keep her in your prayers, I would really appreciate it. She is almost 18. You can read her blog while shes at Mayo Clinic here.....http://www.chitwood2010.blogspot.com/. She has the sweetest heart...its kinda hard not to love her :)
Other than that, theres not too much going on here! Tonight, we will probably just be going to get some dinner and then heading back home. As for tomorrow, I am going to lunch with 3 of my good friends from High School, Christin, Kari and Meredith, and I CAN'T WAIT! I just learned that Meredith is expecting (YAY!) so I get to see her for the 1st time since finding out!
Well, I hope everyone has a good, safe weekend! Talk to you sooner rather than later :)
2 comments:
Today was so much fun! I'm glad we all got to go to lunch with each other! Lets do it again real soon!
Hey chrissy i love you sooooo much. And imiss you. Can't wait till i get to see you in april. well i hope i get to see you in april. thanks for being the best cousin ever. and i love you.
by the way i have this boy i want you to meet. :)
Post a Comment